It's Timmins. It's Spring. Bears are back!

One of the first nuisance black bear calls of the season tied up at least six Timmins Police officers for more than hour this morning. The call occurred in the residential area near Rae Street South and Kent Avenue.Officers were on the scene at approximately 8:00 a.m. when a bear was sighted sniffing around a backyard shed. Police officers, concerned about the large number of children in the area waiting for school buses, cornered the animal and forced it up a tree. At one point around 8:35 a.m., when the bear began moving down the tree, and with children still in the area, an officer fired at the animal. The animal, suffered a non-lethal injury, climbed back up into the cover of the branches. Just before 9:00 a.m. Ministry of Natural Resources technicians arrived. They prepared tranquilizer shots. Over a period of about 30 minutes, two tranquilizer shots were fired into the bear, which then slowly moved down the tree to the ground, where another tranquilizer shot was fired.
The MNR says the bear will be marked with an ear-tag and be relocated away from the city.